CONCACAF Nations League Finals 2023 - General Thread - June 15th & 18th

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

When is this being played?
Thursday, June 15th (semi-finals) and Sunday, June 18th (finals & 3rd place match)

Where is this being played?
Allegiant Stadium in the Greater Las Vegas area

Rankings of Teams (in their respective groups) going into the tournament:
(1) USA        10 pts +12
(2) Panama  10 pts +8
(3) Canada    9 pts  +8
(4) Mexico     8 pts  +5
Therefore, the semi-finals are as follows:
(1) USA vs (4) Mexico
(3) Canada vs (2) Panama

Tickets: Section 142. Details to follow.

Dates of interest:
The "provisional list" 60-man roster is due Tuesday, May 16th.
The final 23-man roster is due Monday, June 5th
https://www.concacaf.com/nations-league/regulations/
The FIFA International Match window begins Monday, June 12th . Therefore it is unlikely that we will play a friendly match before this tournament.

Edit:

https://www.concacaf.com/nations-league/news/semifinal-matchups-and-schedule-confirmed-for-2022-23-concacaf-nations-league-finals-in-las-vegas/

Edited April 4, 2023 by Olympique_de_Marseille

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

3 minutes ago, footballfreak said:

Safe to say we will be the early game.

Edit: I stand corrected. I wonder if that changes before June.

A Thursday night? CONCACAF will find a way to CONCACAF us into the early game don't you worry!

I expect our match will be 4pm Pacific / 7pm Eastern. There is too much money at stake and too many Mexican fans to please.

[Watchmen]

26 minutes ago, Olympique_de_Marseille said:

A Thursday night? CONCACAF will find a way to CONCACAF us into the early game don't you worry!

I expect our match will be 4pm Pacific / 7pm Eastern. There is too much money at stake and too many Mexican fans to please.

7pm Eastern hits "Primetime" for the east coast though.

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

11 minutes ago, Watchmen said:

7pm Eastern hits "Primetime" for the east coast though.

That is true; what is more valuable? The TV rights for 7pm? Or the Box Office revenue?

[ShaneC06]

37 minutes ago, Olympique_de_Marseille said:

That is true; what is more valuable? The TV rights for 7pm? Or the Box Office revenue?

I could say with 100% certainty Mexico vs USA would be in the late window. Everyone's going for that game, not Canada vs Panama. Hopefully we can get a solid group of Canadians out. 

[trc2014]

So with the suspensions in mind.  Aside from good coaching, are there are individual players to be concerned about on Panama?

[Redpunkfiddle]

I am very sure last Gold Cup switched a Mexico or USA game from early to late slot because they wound up not winning their group or something , so they will definitely do that here

[Alex]

42 minutes ago, trc2014 said:

So with the suspensions in mind.  Aside from good coaching, are there are individual players to be concerned about on Panama?

I remember Panama from last year. This is a super winnable game 

Edited March 29, 2023 by Alex

[SoCalTransport]

I'll be there 

[narduch]

14 minutes ago, Alex said:

I remember Panama from last year. This is a super winnable game 

Agreed.

We are heavy favourites

[Obinna]

Vegas not a far flight from Western Canada. This is mighty tempting...

[theaub]

Vegas in June is awful but it also means its cheap so...

[Obinna]

38 minutes ago, narduch said:

Agreed.

We are heavy favourites

I definitely fancy us to get to the final. The "heavy" makes me nervous, but we are clear favourites, on paper or otherwise. 

I try not to be biased, but if I am a neutral looking at this region, Canada is the TEAM to beat right now.

Mexico have a new coach and drop points to Jamaica at home, off the back of a poor World Cup. The USA has an intern coach and looks talented, but disjointed. Canada meanwhile looks like a fine tuned machine. Everything is fluid and the group is mature, not by age but by experience playing together consistently. Canada has the least depth of the 3 teams, but the best player as well, if not the two best players. They also have (I suspect) a psycological edge over the USA and Mexico, having topped the Ocho. No way to prove it, just my hunch. 

Shocking to say perhaps, but I actually would expect Canada to win if I were a neutral. The caveat would they must play the final and semi final as basically the away team. 

[Ruud]

Ticket prices for both games.  Will sell quickly no?

[narduch]

3 minutes ago, Obinna said:

I definitely fancy us to get to the final. The "heavy" makes me nervous, but we are clear favourites, on paper or otherwise. 

I try not to be biased, but if I am a neutral looking at this region, Canada is the TEAM to beat right now.

Mexico have a new coach and drop points to Jamaica at home, off the back of a poor World Cup. The USA has an intern coach and looks talented, but disjointed. Canada meanwhile looks like a fine tuned machine. Everything is fluid and the group is mature, not by age but by experience playing together consistently. Canada has the least depth of the 3 teams, but the best player as well, if not the two best players. They also have (I suspect) a psycological edge over the USA and Mexico, having topped the Ocho. No way to prove it, just my hunch. 

Shocking to say perhaps, but I actually would expect Canada to win if I were a neutral. The caveat would they must play the final and semi final as basically the away team. 

If the US are as goof as their fans want people to believe they should beat a team like El Salvador way more than 1-0,at home 

[Ruud]

1 minute ago, Obinna said:

I definitely fancy us to get to the final. The "heavy" makes me nervous, but we are clear favourites, on paper or otherwise. 

I try not to be biased, but if I am a neutral looking at this region, Canada is the TEAM to beat right now.

Mexico have a new coach and drop points to Jamaica at home, off the back of a poor World Cup. The USA has an intern coach and looks talented, but disjointed. Canada meanwhile looks like a fine tuned machine. Everything is fluid and the group is mature, not by age but by experience playing together consistently. Canada has the least depth of the 3 teams, but the best player as well, if not the two best players. They also have (I suspect) a psycological edge over the USA and Mexico, having topped the Ocho. No way to prove it, just my hunch. 

Shocking to say perhaps, but I actually would expect Canada to win if I were a neutral. The caveat would they must play the final and semi final as basically the away team. 

Agree

 

Weird to  play an emotional semi final and maybe final (don’t get too confident) in Vegas then switch to group matches in gold cup.  Herdman has to manage that.  Gold cup final should be the big game to target.  

[phresh]

Someone posted a tweet announcing the semi-final matchups over on the LigaMX sub. The most upvoted comment is a guy predicting a loss to us in the final. Decent times I must say.

[theaub]

Let's not get beyond ourselves here - the US is the favourite to win.

Yes, this is the best team we've had by a mile, but we also haven't beat the US in the US since 1957.

The one thing in our favour (extreme captain obvious comment incoming) is that we have by far the easier semifinal.

 

Edited March 29, 2023 by theaub

[Obinna]

30 minutes ago, narduch said:

If the US are as goof as their fans want people to believe they should beat a team like El Salvador way more than 1-0,at home 

This is precisely what I am thinking. I watched bits of the game, and the highlights, and they just don't look like a team. The baseline talent of their team is very high insofar as concacaf goes, but you can tell they aren't as well drilled or as well prepared as us. If we end up playing them and they beat us, I feel like it's going to come from a lucky bounce, or something just not going our way on the day. In their current state I definitely don't see them playing us off the park. 

[AvroArrow]

I fully expect a member from the US soccer federation to pull out an old dusty book titled "Concacaf Nations League Rules", and upon blowing off the dust, they'll discover an obscure rule that avoids a US/Mexico semifinal.

[dyslexic nam]

1 hour ago, Obinna said:

Vegas not a far flight from Western Canada. This is mighty tempting...

Do it.  If I can try to get there from PEI, you can do it from the Prairies   

I will even buy you a beer.  

[Gian-Luca]

So, dare I ask what the prize money if we win the tourney is and if we do, does 50% of this money also goes to the women? 😉

 

[CanadaFan123]

49 minutes ago, AvroArrow said:

I fully expect a member from the US soccer federation to pull out an old dusty book titled "Concacaf Nations League Rules", and upon blowing off the dust, they'll discover an obscure rule that avoids a US/Mexico semifinal.

I suspect they’re not that mad about it. This is the only way they get a US v Mexico game because we’d have knocked out either one in the semi final. 

[David Pinto]

Will the tickets be for both games or do they clear the stadium between games. Have a group considering going. 

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

48 minutes ago, David Pinto said:

Will the tickets be for both games or do they clear the stadium between games. Have a group considering going. 

Both matches.

1 hour ago, AvroArrow said:

I fully expect a member from the US soccer federation to pull out an old dusty book titled "Concacaf Nations League Rules", and upon blowing off the dust, they'll discover an obscure rule that avoids a US/Mexico semifinal.

They don't have to because there is a 3rd place match. This allows them to sell two Mexico matches and two USA matches whatever happens.

Edited March 29, 2023 by Olympique_de_Marseille